Advocates hope trips will inspire campus activism
RACHEL POMERANCE
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
After 12 days of advocacy training in the Jewish state, Jonathan Goldberg returned to the University of Michigan with concrete plans for promoting Israel's cause on campus.
"The trick is to translate" passion for Israel "into something that somebody else would care about," says Goldberg, a sophomore who went to Israel for an advocacy workshop run by Hillel and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
It's about "making the people who don't really know much about Israel love Israel," he says.
Students like Goldberg are smitten with a new strategy for Israel advocacy on campus: love.
Thousands of Jewish students went to Israel over winter break on their own or in formal trips organized by groups like the Jewish Agency for Israel and Birthright Israel.
Hillel, the central Jewish campus group, unveiled a campaign called "Love is Real," launched by sexpert Ruth Westheimer, to inspire passion - or love - for Israel.
"When you love something, you can disagree with aspects of the policy, but at the end of the day it's still something you very much support," says Daniel Frankenstein, a senior at the University of California at Berkeley.
The Israel programs aim to imbue students with the knowledge and emotion only first-hand experience in Israel can provide, organizers says. The goal is for students to return to campus with personal stories and new energy to help them promote Israel effectively and get others involved in the cause.
Activists say the stakes are big. College campuses represent the next generation of American opinion makers, and showing them Israel's side is essential for the security of the U.S.-Israel bond.
After the beginning of the intifada in September 2000 led to an outbreak of anti-Israel activism at campuses across the United States, Jewish groups have worked to craft increasingly sophisticated advocacy training for students.
Three years in, the activists behind the advocacy programs are confident the message is getting out.
Ritzy pro-Israel programs groom campus activists into savvy leaders, and sometimes even professional lobbyists. AIPAC, for example, offered full-time jobs to three of the students who attended the group's winter trip.
AIPAC calls its campus strategy "retail engagement" - dispatching pro-Israel messages on a peer-to-peer basis.
The anti-Israel activists turn off students with their hostile attitude, some of the advocates for Israel believe.
"We're really making it clear to people that the pro-Israel movement is one that encompasses many different beliefs," says Frankenstein. It is "very attractive to people."
At the University of Pennsylvania, pro-Israel activists say they can't take it for granted that the issue won't become heated on campus.
"When you look at the media and you watch TV and CNN, the image that one can have of the situation is one that doesn't lend itself to support for Israel," says Gabrielle Mashbaum, a student leader for the Jewish National Fund's Caravan for Democracy, which sends speakers to campuses to promote Israel's democratic values.
"When people don't have that background or education in the history, then there's a risk of sort of losing them," Mashbaum says.
That's why activist groups are turning to one-on-one advocacy.
"What keeps me up at night is that we've only scratched the surface," says Jonathan Kessler, AIPAC's leadership development director.
"We've got the right prescription," he says, pointing out that pro Israel groups constantly are launching new programs that interest students. But he's worried that only a quarter of the country's 2,400 major colleges have a pro-Israel presence, and many students have grown tired of the ongoing conflict.
The answer, Kessler and others say, is personal engagement.
AIPAC teaches students to engage others through pro-Israel voter registration. In addition to conducting regional campaign training institutes, AIPAC urges students to get involved with political campaigns and organize student delegations to lobby congressmen in their districts and in Washington.
Hillel has adopted the same tack. The group is asking its nearly 3,000 students returning from winter trips to Israel to give their peers "Love is Real" buttons.
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